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This week: The Occult Hand Edited by: Legerdemain  
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The Order of the Occult Hand
Last month I did part three of my occult series on astrology. Part two was about black magic. And this month I'd like to introduce The Order of the Occult Hand. This is something I just came across while researching the occult topic and thought the amusing tale would tickle your muse.
Found in the ever-so-reliable Wikipedia, so please take this with the grain of salt it is meant...The Order of the Occult Hand - The phrase was introduced by Joseph Flanders, then a police reporter of The Charlotte News, in the fall of 1965, when he reported on a millworker who was shot by his own family when he came back home late at night. He wrote:
It was as if an occult hand had reached down from above and moved the players like pawns upon some giant chessboard.
— Joseph Flanders, The Charlotte News
Amused by this purple passage, in a local bar, his colleagues decided to commemorate Flanders' achievement by forming the Order of the Occult Hand. They even showed Flanders a banner made of a bed sheet depicting a bloody hand reaching out of a purple cloud. Among the original members were: R.C. Smith, an associate editor; Stewart Spencer, then an editorial writer; John Gin, the city editor; and several others, who vowed to get the words into print as soon as possible. The editors were not happy about this mischief at all and ordered copy editors to be extremely vigilant, yet the phrase kept slipping into the paper and even into Down Beat, a jazz magazine, by Smith. The News revealed this tradition of high spirits, how it started, in 1985, when it went out of circulation.
Alternatively, Paul Greenberg, the Pulitzer prize-winning editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, considers that Reese Cleghorn, then an editorial writer of The Charlotte Observer, was the one who originated the Order. Cleghorn denied this claim. The Boston Globe once reported that the Occult Hand Club was a replacement for the Defective Busbar Club, which was open to any journalist who used the words, such as, "the cause of the fire was attributed to a defective busbar, officials said."
The occult-hand phrase did not stop in the Charlotte News and Observer, but has crept onto other media. The use of the phrase has spread to newspaper media around the world like "a cough in a classroom" and "a pox". The Order was occasionally endangered by reckless and artless users of the phrase, but it retained overall secrecy until 2004, when James Janega of the Chicago Tribune published a thorough investigation about the Order. Upon exposure to the public, Greenberg made a full confession.
In 2006, Greenberg announced that the Order had chosen a new secret phrase at an annual editorial writers' convention and resumed a stealth operation.
Hope that tickles and inspires your writing funny-bone.  Write on!
This month's question: Have you ever slipped a phrase into your writing as an ode to another writer?
Answer below  Editors love feedback! 
Ref: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_the_Occult_Hand
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#2106097 by Not Available. |
Excerpt: “Detective Jacobs.” Her eyes glanced up the hall then returned to mine. “Mike. My grandmother, she’s a very powerful woman. I know it’s a long shot, but she may be able to help.”
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Excerpt: “I’m broke. Can I borrow some wrapping paper?” Janice begged. The Preston’s were so large someone was always sharing the latest family crises. Christmas was a happy mess of loaning clothes for holiday parties, car keys, gas money for shopping, or hankies to dry frustrated tears.
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Excerpt: John happily wrapped the gifts singing Jingle Bells to himself while he watched the news. When he was done he put his hands on his hips and exhales. “Finally, done!” Then his satisfaction turned to panic as he realized he forgot to label them! His relatives would be arriving in twenty minutes.
Excerpt: "That's how you keep the specialness," Grandma said, wiping her hands of her apron. "Do you see them?" There was no response. "Millie?"
"Mima, someone's gotten into your pantry," Millie's concerned voice finally answered.
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Excerpt: "Do you have any experience?"
"I've passed the training course. I know how to follow orders." Sammy shifted in his spot, uneasy about the heavy glare of his superior, "I also have--"
| |  | Small Moments (13+)
People are born with a timer counting down to their death. A woman meets with a counselor.
#2104788 by JW Fiction  |
Excerpt: I had another bad day at work today. As a senior, and by senior I mean my expiration is past 65 years old, I'm required to contribute three decades of civil service before I retire. This year they have me in the county hospital as a counselor. It's much easier on my body than my last assignment in railway construction, but curiously, just as tiring on my mind. At only 32 I often feel unqualified to give advice to those in pain, but at the same time I feel that I'm starting to merge with my timer. I've always been told I have an old soul.
Excerpt: Lietel headed for the kitchen but stopped when he ran into Somet and Pienot struggling with a large canvas bag they were dragging across the floor. “What are you two dragging in that bag?” he asked.
“The troop has been out all night finding chestnuts for the roast tonight. I think we have more this year than last,” Pienot replied.
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This month's question: Have you ever slipped a phrase into your writing as an ode to another writer?
Answer below Editors love feedback!
Last month's question: Have you found inspiration in astrology?
Elfin Dragon-finally published  responded: I'd like to respond to both last week's question and this weeks. First, with regard to "black magic" a lot of people refer to it as "dark arts" or magic which will, in turn, do harm. Magic, no matter what kind, has the ability to do harm. There is no black or white to it. It simply is. I think the best example are from the "Dresden Files" novels. He makes a distinction that yes some magic can be "darker" than others, but even magic meant to heal can be turned to darker purposes.
Second, astrology. There is no real basis of astrology ever really working to tell the future, past, or present working in ones life. It only works due to the power of suggestion. You might argue the same with magic because many things which might seem like magic are simply a science not understood by the one viewing it. Which in some cases are true. But the two are very far apart. Unfortunately I cannot explain certain things which are magic, where astrology I can. And as for inspiration? Always from what I read.
Thanks for the feedback!
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Action/Adventure: December 21, 2016 Issue [#8042]
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